Someone’s touch jolted me upright. “Don’t!” I screamed. I took off running far from the gravesite. My feet slipped on mud, but I regained my traction as I found a large oak to shelter me from the wrath of the storm.
My body collapsed, my back against the stump as I pulled my knees to my chest. I shivered and wailed, unable to stop my tears. My father was gone. It was a fact I would have to face. It wasn’t fair.
I don’t know how much time passed before I heard his voice, the softest whisper against the sound of steady rain and thunder.
“I’m sorry, Olive.” I had buried my face in my legs, wrapped my arms tight around myself trying to keep warm. I was shivering. Slowly I eased my head, sniffling as Joshua stood above me. His own eyes were red and I wondered why he was upset. He hadn’t lost anyone. I didn’t answer him. My throat was raw from screaming and the tears just kept coming harder and faster. “Can I sit with you?” he asked. Before I opened my mouth to answer, he sat down beside me and his shoulder brushed against mine. I felt the strangest spark as he stared at me, eyes filled with hope. He didn’t have to say a word because I understood. He was there for me.
CHAPTER 1
Lying on my stomach beneath the tall oak tree, the branches covered the morning sun as I glanced behind me at Joshua. He had made himself content, lying with his head in the small of my back. I nearly laughed as he situated himself as if it was completely normal and something we usually did. It wasn’t.
“Comfortable?” I laughed, looking back as his legs stretched out just past the shade, his feet in the sun. My fingers moved through the blades of grass, playing with them as I spoke.
“I am, actually.” He nodded and though I couldn’t see his movements I could feel them. It was strange and oddly calming.
“I’m not ready for today,” I whispered, afraid someone else might overhear my fear. I knew no one else was nearby, but I still found it hard to voice.
He reached for my hand, finding my fingers and giving a tentative squeeze. “I don’t think any of us are,” he confessed. “I keep thinking how everything is about to change for us.” He paused before casting a glance at me. I could feel him staring, even as I avoided making eye contact. “We could always refuse the match.”
I scoffed at the idea, “And die in the Gravelands?” I shook my head once. “No thanks.” I wasn’t looking forward to getting married. It was the requirement of the government for those who turned eighteen.
Joshua moved to sit up. Immediately, I felt the loss of his body’s warmth against mine. “Maybe it won’t be such a terrible waste,” he suggested. “There must be a few guys you wouldn’t mind being matched with?” Sixteen boys and sixteen girls were part of the marriage ceremony: our entire graduating class.
“Right,” I sighed thinking it over. I knew the boys in our class, but I couldn’t imagine seeing any of them every day, let alone sharing a home with one of them. It was preposterous.
“You’re telling me you’ve never thought about today?” Josh asked with mild curiosity. We’ve always known the day would come, that our match would be one of the sixteen from our school. It would be a lie to tell him I never wondered who I’d marry. Joshua smiled brightly. “I always imagined you’d be my match.”
“Really?” I felt the slightest bit of warmth spread across my cheeks that he would want to spend the rest of his life with me.
He laughed nudging my arm. “No.” I tried not to hide the embarrassment coloring my face as I stared down at the grass. “Come on, wouldn’t that be weird?” Joshua smiled at me. “We’re best friends. It’s not natural.”
I bit down hard on my bottom lip to keep from crying. I didn’t quite understand what I felt, but I needed to keep my emotions from surfacing. Ignoring Joshua beside me, I glanced up from the grass and across the land at the graveyard, my father’s home, just a few yards away.
I closed my eyes, feeling the ache in my heart returning.
“Mom, please you have to come with me,” I begged. My hands held purple and blue wildflowers I’d spent all afternoon picking with Joshua’s help. Today was the first anniversary of my father’s death, and I wanted to celebrate in a way of sorts.
“I’m not going there, I have too much to do.” She shook her head once and walked into the kitchen further away from me. She dug through the fridge, but it was too early to make dinner. She was stalling. Even I could see that.
I followed her, flowers in hand and placed them on the counter. “What else do you have to do, Mom? What could be more important?” My eyes pleaded with her to come with me to his grave. I wanted to remember him as he was and shower his home with flowers.
“You wouldn’t understand. You’re a child,” she scolded me. “Now get the flowers off the table and go wash up for dinner.”
My hands ripped the flowers from the counter. I took off running out of the house toward the cemetery. Tears burned my eyes and ran down my cheeks as I stomped through the graveyard over dying grass searching for his resting place.
Finding it, I dropped to my knees, the flowers spilling from my hands. “I’m so sorry, Dad. I wanted her to come, but she couldn’t. She was too busy – you know how she is.” I wiped the tears away as I fixed the flowers on the ground and rearranged them properly. “I love you so much.” I sniffled once, shivering from the cold autumn air, but refused to leave.
My body froze in place, feeling a warm gloved hand on my shoulder. I glanced back surprised to see Joshua, his blue eyes staring down at me as he sat beside me on the ground. “Hi, Mr. Parker.”
“Olive?” I felt Joshua’s voice in my head and shook it once bringing myself back. The sun felt warm, and I realized now he’d placed his arm around my shoulder. “You spaced out for a minute.”
“I guess I did,” I whispered, glancing from the graves back down to the grass. I didn’t want to tell him it was a welcome escape from what he’d said just moments ago– that he’d joked about us being matched and then seemed somehow repulsed by it.
He nodded slowly, keeping me close beside him. “There are a few girls I wouldn’t mind being matched with this afternoon,” he confessed, bringing us right back where we started. I wasn’t sure I was grateful for the conversation, but I also didn’t want him to see he’d hurt me. I was sure it wasn’t intentional. He’d been joking. “I just keep thinking, what if they refuse me?”
“What?” That caught me off-guard. It was unheard of to refuse your match. It wasn’t illegal, per se, but it might as well have been. If you denied the match, then you were defying the government of Cabal, which ruled our town of Genesis. The law stated someone could choose not to marry, but then the government no longer had the need to represent that person. As such, the unmarried were banished from any and all government cities and forced to reside in the Gravelands. Anyone who was sent beyond the walls without food or transportation would die. It was no secret that starvation and dehydration would likely be the first to kill you.
“I’m worried one of the girls might look at me and not want to marry me,” Joshua repeated. He must have thought I hadn’t heard him. I had. I just couldn’t fathom who would ever turn their match down. I’d never seen it happen, but long before I was born, there were stories of it.
“Oh, come on.” I rolled my eyes and nudged him. His grip on my shoulders loosened, and I wrapped an arm around his waist. My head came to rest on his shoulder as I let out a soft sigh. “No one would rather seek death than marry you.” I laughed softly. “You’re not that bad of a catch.”